Sled dog racing is Alaska’s state sport and Gov. Sean Parnell has officially endorsed Alaska as a “right to mush” state.

On Monday Parnell signed a resolution “recognizing, honoring, supporting, and encouraging support for dog mushing and dog mushers” in Alaska.

Nome residents Diana Haecker and Nils Hahn drafted House Concurrent Resolution 24 to safeguard the sport and its human and canine participants throughout the state.

Explaining the cultural significance of mushing in Alaska, Haecker said, “It has its place in history, its place in the present, and I think more important certainly its place in the future, and we felt it needed to be preserved.”

Haecker and Hahn run their own kennel and modeled the resolution off the nation’s “right to farm” statutes, which protect farmers and ranchers from nuisance lawsuits complaining of farming-related activities like noise or smell.

Alaska’s “right to mush” resolution is not statutory but rather signifies the legislature’s support of mushing and its significance to the culture and people of Alaska.

“It’s more of a symbolic resolution,” Haecker explained, “but I think it also speaks that every legislator in the state has agreed that mushing is worth preserving and that it is an acceptable activity in the state.”

The pair created the resolution after mushers across the state began reporting harassment like obstructed trails, traps set on trails, and lawsuits threatening kennel operations.

The resolution received state-wide support from the Alaska Federation of Natives, the Association of Village Council Presidents, and the Willow Area Community Organization. Four-time Iditarod champion Lance Mackey and 15-time Iditarod finisher Mike Williams Sr. rallied behind its passage. Nome Kennel Club President Chrystie Salesky signed a resolution of support.

“It gives backing to us,” Salesky said, speaking on behalf of the Nome Kennel Club, “reassuring us from the state that this is something that they want to see continued and not cease to exist.”

Salesky points out many mushers engage in the sport recreationally rather than competitively though some still use teams to run trap lines and haul wood. Salesky said the resolution goes beyond protecting a sport to sustaining a lifestyle.

“Even though we have all these races going on,” Salesky explained, “there’s a lot of people in smaller communities— Nome, too— where we’re just recreational mushers, but it’s still our way of life. And it’s just great to have something in effect from the state that supports our way of life so mushing can still continue to thrive into the future.”

Rep. Neal Foster carried the resolution through the House.

Addressing the legislature during a floor speech in March, Foster said in support of the resolution, “It’s good for the state because it’s an image of the state. When people think of Alaska, they also think of dog mushing. And it’s great for the economy, because so many people come from other states to Alaska to see the various races. So we see this as a positive thing, you know, and we just want to let folks know that we support them.”

Both the House and Senate unanimously passed the resolution in March as Iditarod finishers were crossing beneath the burled arch in Nome.

]]>http://www.knom.org/wp/blog/2014/08/15/gov-parnell-endorses-alaska-as-right-to-mush-state/feed/411250Dredger Dies Diving Outside Nomehttp://www.knom.org/wp/blog/2014/08/14/dredger-dies-diving-outside-nome/
Thu, 14 Aug 2014 23:34:16 +0000http://www.knom.org/wp/?p=11235A man diving off a dredge was found floating in the water and declared dead late Wednesday.]]>http://www.knom.org/wp-audio/2014/08/2014-08-15-Diver-Sean-Beals-death.mp3

A man diving off a dredge outside Nome was found floating in the water and declared dead late Wednesday night. The diver was Sean Beals, 39, of Seattle, Washington.

“The diver was noticed at about 10:30 p.m. by someone else working on the tender,” explained Megan Peters, a spokesperson for Alaska State Troopers, “and they attempted to get him help as quickly as they could, performing lifesaving measures.”

Peters said Beals was diving off a 44-foot-long gold dredge named “Argo”—mentioned in a miner profile last year by KNOM—about four miles east of Nome and a quarter mile offshore. Another crew member noticed Beals floating face-down and unresponsive in the water and pulled him on deck, where the crew member began administering CPR.

Search and Rescue responded to the incident, transporting Beals to Norton Sound Regional Hospital where he was declared deceased.

Peters says it’s unknown if Beals drowned or suffered a medical emergency while diving, bu no foul play is suspected.

Beals’ body is being flown to Anchorage to undergo an autopsy by the State Medical Examiner’s office. The U.S. Coast Guard is sending a marine investigator to Nome to analyze the death as a major marine incident.

Harbormaster Lucas Stotts said Beals’ death is the third is as many years during Nome’s summer gold rush season. Stotts said all three past deaths have been the result of divers either drowning or having medical emergencies like heart attacks while diving.

]]>11235Dried Filter Paper Testing Food Security in Western Alaskahttp://www.knom.org/wp/blog/2014/08/11/old-technology-new-use-testing-food-security-in-western-alaska/
Mon, 11 Aug 2014 15:00:07 +0000http://www.knom.org/wp/?p=11111For the first time in the United States, a technology traditionally used on humans is testing possible widespread threats to food security.]]>http://knom.org/wp-audio/2014/08/2014-08-11-filter-paper.mp3

For the first time in the United States, a technology traditionally used on humans is testing possible widespread threats to food security.

The technology is filter paper, and it is used to collect blood samples. Throughout the Bering Strait region, the Alaska Native Tribal Health Consortium is distributing the paper to subsistence hunters to collect blood specimens from subsistence mammals.

James Berner is the Senior Director for Science at the Division of Community Health at ANTHC and is leading the project, which is funded by an $888,282 grant from the Environmental Protection Agency.

“We’ll put kits together in a small plastic bag,” Berner explained, “and the kit has an envelope to mail the dried filter paper sample in and a form for the hunter to fill out that says what the animal is, the sex, where it was collected, and the date.”

The samples will test for metal contaminants like mercury, human-made contaminants like PCBs, and antibodies to pathogens an animal has previously been exposed to.

The researchers theorize contaminants and pathogens are escalating in the Arctic as climate change alters wind and ocean currents. If these substances are increasing, they could accumulate in the bodies of subsistence mammals, threatening food security for communities throughout Western Alaska.

“Right now,” Berner said, “we don’t know the magnitude and the actors in the food security threats. We only know what they might be and what we’ve found in a few animals over the years. And the way to deal with this is to be able to test the herds that you harvest from and find out what the prevalence of any given risk is.”

Berner said federal agencies like the National Oceanic Atmospheric Association and the Fish and Wildlife Service are interested in the possible changes occurring in Arctic wildlife, but their limited number of scientists can only be in so many places at once to study those shifts. Subsistence hunters, on the other hand, cover a broad geographic area and collect hundreds of potential samples per community per year— hence the filter paper kits.

Filter paper is more convenient for hunters to use than traditional methods of sampling, such as syringes and vials. Berner said the kits can be carried in a coat pocket; they do not have to be kept frozen; and there is no regulation for mailing filter paper blood specimens like there is for mailing liquid blood.

Richard Kuzuguk is with the Shishmaref Environmental Program and underwent training with ANTHC on how to use the kits this summer. Kuzuguk said the lightweight portability of the filter paper increases the chances hunters will take the sampling kits with them on their hunts.

“Sometimes we travel 72 miles to a hunt area in the ocean,” Kuzuguk explained. “That would eliminate a lot of the weight that we carry back as far as our subsistence, because most of time, most hunters will think of the subsistence first then the sampling secondary.”

Kuzuguk will be part of a team distributing the kits to hunters in Shishmaref. Participation is voluntary, and Kuzuguk expects 70-percent of the community’s hunters to take part.

Kuzuguk said recent instances like the 2011 Unusual Mortality Event where hundreds of sick seals were reported throughout the Bering Sea is motivating hunters to participate in the sampling, and the community will focus on collecting specimens from bearded seals, Shishmaref’s primary food staple.

“We depend on bearded seal for a good portion of our diet year-round,” Kuzuguk said. “That area and concern with the health and safety with our subsistence food is a real high priority.”

]]>11111Reduce Obesity, Reduce Medical Costs, Nome Students Contribute to the Changehttp://www.knom.org/wp/blog/2014/08/07/reduce-obesity-reduce-medical-costs-nome-students-contribute-to-the-change/
Thu, 07 Aug 2014 23:54:44 +0000http://www.knom.org/wp/?p=11068Preventing obesity in Alaska’s children today will reduce medical costs in the future, according to a recent paper. Nome Public Schools is part of a state-wide initiative to accomplish just that.]]>http://knom.org/wp-audio/2014/08/2014-08-07-childhood-obesity.mp3

Preventing obesity in Alaska’s children today will reduce medical costs in the future, according to a paper released by the Institute of Social and Economic Research at the University of Alaska Anchorage.

“Tackling this issue right now,” said Mouhcine Guettabi, Assistant Professor of Economics at UAA and author of the study, “even that means investing a lot of dollars today, will actually end up being beneficial in the long run.”

The paper was commissioned by the Alaska Department of Health and Social Services to determine if obesity prevention programs—like the one in Nome Public Schools—will save the state money in the future. Karol Fink manages the Alaska Obesity Prevention and Control Program.

Fink summarized, “That’s the main conclusion of the publication is that, yes, you will definitely see a return on investment if you’re able to change childhood obesity prevalence rates.”

The study estimates a one-percent decrease in the obesity rate of six to 11 year olds will save $3.48 million in medical costs over 20 years. For 12 to 19 year olds, savings will top 11 million dollars. And that is using conservative estimates Guettabi said.

According to the paper, 15.2-percent of Alaskans between the ages of two and 19 are obese, resulting in excess medical costs of about seven million dollars annually. As the children age, the medical costs increase. In 20 years, the medical costs incurred by that same group of children is projected to reach $624 million in today’s dollars, again a conservative estimate.

If nothing is done about childhood obesity, Guettabi said it will become a trend repeated in future generations.

“That group of children,” Guettabi said, “obviously is going to age, and then we’re going to have a new group of children that’s going to be in the same situation. And so unless we do something that has long-lasting effects, we’re going to be repeating the cycle.”

To avoid that from happening, the state is investing in school-based obesity prevention programs, focusing on increasing physical activity, improving school nutrition and wellness education. The programs began last year. Eight are ongoing across the state with one in Nome.

Danielle Slingsby is the Executive Director of the Nome Community Center and applied for the grant.

“Our main focus last year,” Slingsby said, “was to, one, get in the schools, see what’s there, see what nutrition standards they have that are being met and in place. So last year was a huge year for just seeing what was there and figuring out what we need to change.”

This year, one of the goals is to collect height and weight measurements from every student in Nome Public Schools.

Commenting on the initiative, Slingsby said, “The height and weight measurements are a biggie, and I know it’s contentious among some parents.”

Slingsby said the measurements are necessary to track the progress of the program, and the instructors have learned methods for taking the numbers, like not letting the students see their measurements and sending the information home to parents and guardians with recommendations on how to improve the child’s wellness.

Those recommendations include efforts like reducing screen time—be it in front of a TV, a computer, a phone, or a video game—as well as increasing physical activity and improving diet.

Slingsby said diet can be the most expensive change to implement. She points to various local and state programs that could offer additional options.

“Now, with the cost of food here,” Slingsby said, “sometimes that [diet change] can be a challenge for some people. But with the benefits of the WIC program, food stamps, and the food bank, you can most likely supplement some of those staples and be able to buy healthier food as well.”

The obesity prevention program is in its second year and is scheduled to run four years.

]]>11068Voluntary Safety Inspections Occurring at Nome Harborhttp://www.knom.org/wp/blog/2014/08/04/voluntary-safety-inspections-occurring-at-nome-harbor/
Mon, 04 Aug 2014 17:00:42 +0000http://www.knom.org/wp/?p=11017The harbor is packed; summer dredging season at its peak; and together the Nome harbor and the U.S. Coast Guard are working to get vessels into safer condition. ]]>

The harbor is packed; summer dredging season at its peak; and together the Nome harbor staff and the U.S. Coast Guard are working to get vessels into safer condition.

Now through Thursday August 7, the Coast Guard will be conducting dockside safety examinations for dredging vessels. The examinations are free and voluntary with the goal of getting as many operations as possible up to Coast Guard safety regulation.

Coast Guard Lt. Tom Pauser will be running the exams. “I have a list that I’m going to explain with each mariner,” Pauser said, “display numbers, their registrations, life jackets, visual distress signals, flares, and the list goes down.”

Pauser said the examinations are intended to educate mariners on what they can do to meet safety compliance. For that reason, mariners will not receive penalties or fines during the inspections for any unmet safety standards.

But the examinations happen dockside. Any vessel boarded on the water not meeting requirements could receive a violation.

“So when they say these are voluntary, they’re not going to come and say, ‘Hey, I see something wrong. Now you get a fine,’” said Nome Harbormaster Lucas Stotts. “These are so you have an opportunity to fix those problems and get steered in the right direction, so later in the year or at any time you can operate in the safest manner. And that way, when their enforcement folks come up, you’ll be ready for them.”

Stotts said one of the most common safety violations in Nome waters is vessels not carrying enough lifejackets—one for every passenger— and mariners not wearing them.

“We have people fall overboard all the time,” said Stotts. “We just had a guy the other day fall overboard— half hour in the water. And he was wearing a PFD [personal flotation device], or he probably would have drown.”

Another common violation Pauser said is mariners not registering their vessels with the DMV.

Stotts said the number of dredges this year is lower than last year, but the sizes of the operations are bigger. The amount of fishing vessels has remained consistent. Meanwhile, other vessels like cargo, research, and fuel are up in number as interest in the Arctic escalates.

Overall Stotts said the harbor is more jam-packed than ever. With less room and more activity, safety inspections act as preventative measures to reduce instances and emergencies in an area already stretched to capacity.

Commenting on the shift, Stotts said, “Nome got hit with this increase in mining activity fairly recently and fairly fast, so the port and the City are both going through their growing pains, trying to keep up with the demand from our user base.”

The voluntary safety inspections are occurring now through Thursday August 7. They are being offered to dredges and commercial fishing vessels. Call the Nome harbor at 907-443-6619 to schedule an appointment.

]]>11017Farewellhttp://www.knom.org/wp/blog/2014/08/01/farewell/
http://www.knom.org/wp/blog/2014/08/01/farewell/#commentsSat, 02 Aug 2014 00:36:25 +0000http://www.knom.org/wp/?p=11008As her time in Nome comes to a close, Anna Rose reflects on what she'll take with her when she leaves.]]>

You know what I’ll miss, I’ll miss the light. The way it glows iridescent, shimmering all the colors at once in the purest white. In the lower-48 the light burns sulfuric, all yellow and egg yolk and fire. Here, even in deepest winter, the light is enough to break your heart— bursting fuchsia pink and blazing gold in a perpetual sunrise and sunset across the sky, living and dying in three hours time. Every day, chest aching, I took a picture.

And then at night, if we were lucky, the aurora borealis. One night, us girls loaded into the truck and drove out into the darkness, trying to catch that nocturnal glow. And climbing out in the snow, far from the glare of town, green streaks rose electric and unearthly in painted arches, shivering around us. For the first time, high on this polar planetary point, I could see the bowed dome of the sky.

You know what I’ll remember, I’ll remember pulling salmon from a net, mucus smearing and slicking my hands, untangling their silver bodies from the threads, muscle and will fighting beneath my fingers, saying “Thank you. Thank you,” as I dropped their bodies into a bucket, saying “Thank you. Thank you,” as I shoved a knife in their gut and ran it up the belly, saying “Thank you. Thank you,” as I cut every fiber from the bones, saying “Thank you. Thank you,” as I cooked the pink flesh and ate every bite. A vegetarian for six years, for the first time, I felt I had respected another’s life.

You know what I’ll hold, I’ll hold the ocean, crashing slate-colored against the shore. I’d never lived by water until I moved to the Bering Sea. And that sound, the way is reaches up and pulls you to its chest with the gentlest of mighty hands, rocking, “Shhh. Shhh.” And in the winter, walking out as far as the frozen thickness will bear me, and standing in the most absolute of silence, spinning circles on the ice, feet leaving wild grooves in the snow. But above all, it’s that standing on the shore, looking out, the water saying, “This is where you end.” At least for me. I am no mariner. And feeling the greatest relief on that visual limit of mortality.

You know what I’ll carry, I’ll carry community. I didn’t understand the word before Nome. Community was always an adjective as in “Community Center” or “Community Broadcasting,” never a thing itself, never a becoming, not noun or verb. Until Nome, that is. Two days ago I walked one and a half blocks and got stopped by four people along the way, stepping out of their four houses, all addressing me by name, one saying they had a picture of me from the Forth of July Celebration, another asking when I was leaving, and two more just inquiring about my day.

But here community is more than people knowing my face or calling my name. It’s attending meetings and walks and celebrations and seeing the town come together, again and again and inexhaustibly again, investing their time and support in this place they call home and taking ownership of each other. It’s changing my introductory question from, “What do you do?” to “What do you do within the community?” Because in Nome, a person is more than the sum of what they occupationally produce. With a smaller population and less competition for positions but just as much demand for services, people wear more hats. But it’s not the costume change that multiplies faculties; it’s viewing that person in manifold dimensions, and in that fullness, granting her or him the dignity of recognition as a whole person. And from that shift, it’s me changing how I see myself, my occupation no longer determining my human value but existing as one part of a million-capacity being.

You know what I’ll give, or at least try my damndest, I’ll give what I was freely given. Over the past year, I often said the best part of this adventure was my fellow volunteers—my co-workers, my housemates, my friends, my Nome family. I believe we become the people we surround ourselves with. And over the past almost 12 months, I’ve watched us volunteers slowly morph into one another, retaining our entities but merging our edges like five individual circles pushed into a Venn diagram— picking up a vocal inflection, an emotional habit, a gesture, a shifted perspective. From these four people I have learned grace, thankless service, hospitality, and generosity of time and spirit. And by them meeting me where I am, they have taught me the elegance of extending that respect to others.

Then there’s all the small moments I’ll cherish— of being alive, connected, and so, so free. Standing on my bike pedals, sea breeze carrying me for miles along the peach and turquoise sunset coast. Holding hands around a home cooked meal. Looking out a window, chin resting on the sill, watching river and beavers float past, alongside a dearest of friend. Running breathless up the cemetery hill, fireweed blazing underfoot, Nome and the harbor spreading beneath on my right, hazy foothills rising on my left. Reading in the back chair of the library. Sitting around a bonfire on the beach. Grasping the faintest margin of what it means for someone to be continuing a 10,000-year-old culture on the same land where it began. Working harder and longer past what I thought my limit could endure at a job that for a year allowed me to be audience and storyteller to the most spellbinding and consequential of tales. And every day, walking thousands of aimless miles around and around and around and through Nome.

At the end of Maurice Sendak’s book Where the Wild Things Are, the main character Max, though on the wildest of adventure among the wildest of creatures, finds he needs to return “where someone loved him best of all.” It’s time for me to do the same.

To Western Alaska, to KNOM, and to Nome, thank you, farewell, and see you later.

A U.S. Coast Guard response boat is sitting in the Nome harbor, streamlining response operations and conducting safety boardings.

The USCG flew in the vessel—a “25-foot response boat small”— on Wednesday from Valdez on a C-130 aircraft.

“So we wanted to bring the small boat up here,” said Coast Guard Petty Officer 2nd Class Grant Devuyst, “which we did we’ve done before, to test our capabilities, to see how hard it is to get it here, as well as the crew, to see what we have to do to get it into the water here.”

The venture is part of the Coast Guard’s 2014 Arctic Shield, an operation to increase the branch’s presence in the Arctic as marine traffic escalates.

A seven-person crew is accompanying the response boat, a vessel used to conduct search and rescue, tuggings, and boardings, and often deployed in situations inaccessible to the Coast Guard’s larger cutters.

With the response boats being stationed in Valdez, Juneau, and Ketchikan— hundreds of miles from Western Alaska— part of the vessel’s mission in Nome is streamlining response logistics in case of an emergency.

“There are more boaters out here, all types of different vessels,” explained Devuyst. “We don’t have a permanent base here that’s able to perform our missions such as search and rescue. So we’re making sure that we can get our assets here to perform those missions.”

At the same time, the Coast Guard is working to prevent these response missions. Over the next two weeks, the Coast Guard will be conducting boardings around Nome to inspect onboard safety gear and look for equipment such as lifejackets, fire extinguishers, and communication devices.

While these boardings are going on, the Coast Guard will also be holding voluntary safety inspections, beginning this weekend and running through next Friday. Call the Nome harbor to sign up for an appointment.

]]>11001Shishmaref Airstrip Should Remain Open After Visit From FAAhttp://www.knom.org/wp/blog/2014/07/31/shishmaref-airstrip-should-remain-open-after-visit-from-faa/
Thu, 31 Jul 2014 19:51:54 +0000http://www.knom.org/wp/?p=10916Aviation officials from across the state are visiting runways and airports throughout Western Alaska to gain an eye-witness understanding of rural aviation.]]>http://knom.org/wp-audio/2014/07/2014-07-31-9-aviation-board.mp3

Aviation officials from across the state are visiting runways and airports throughout Western Alaska to gain an eye-witness understanding of rural aviation.

On Tuesday the Alaska Aviation Advisory Board, along with officials from the Federal Aviation Administration and the Department of Transportation, visited Wales, Port Clarence, and Shishmaref to inspect the areas’ runways and talk with community members about flight concerns.

The outfit also flew over Diomede, Brevig Mission, and Teller to view their air facilities.

Lee Ryan is the Chairman of the Aviation Advisory Board, a body appointed by the governor to provide council on aviation matters across the state.

Ryan said visiting these communities allows the Board to better understand aviation in rural communities and how decisions made in Washington DC and Juneau affect the bush and how they could be amended for rural areas.

One of those amendments might come for Shishmaref. The FAA has threatened to shut down nighttime operations for the community’s airstrip because of the runway’s proximity to a road leading to a nearby dump. The shutdown would almost eliminate flights during the dark winter months, severing the community from necessary goods and services.

Ryan said the trip to Shishmaref allowed officials to see the situation for themselves and find solutions to curtail the issue.

“Being able to do these trips with the FAA officials onboard,” Ryan explained, “they can see issues that happen, and say, ‘Okay, well, the road is way out there. Let’s think of something that can make it usable and feasible to not run into an overnight shutdown.’”

Ryan said the officials with the FAA and DOT will work with personnel in Washington DC to make sure Shishmaref does not experience any “service interruptions.”

]]>10916Centuries-Old Fishing Knowledge Being Recorded For the First Time From the Upper Kobukhttp://www.knom.org/wp/blog/2014/07/30/centuries-old-fishing-knowledge-being-recorded-for-the-first-time-from-the-upper-kobuk/
Thu, 31 Jul 2014 05:45:32 +0000http://www.knom.org/wp/?p=10906For the first time, centuries-old fishing knowledge from the Upper Kobuk River is being recorded with funding from a National Park Service Historic Preservation Grant.]]>http://knom.org/wp-audio/2014/07/2014-07-30-Ambler-fish-knowledge.mp3

For the first time, centuries-old fishing knowledge from the Upper Kobuk River is being recorded.

“The knowledge that is in us, in our brains, has not ever been written,” said Virginia Commack, Tribe Manager for the Native Village of Ambler, “not even the elders, we learned it from, which is like 500 plus years old. I’d say it’s a 1,000 or more years knowledge that we’ve never been able to write down to pass onto our children.”

Commack said the transcriptions will contain holistic traditional fishing knowledge—how to harvest and process fish, how to observe fish habitats and populations, and how to safeguard the Upper Kobuk.

“Our people used to be the real stewards of the land and the waters,” said Commack. “They used to teach us how to keep everything healthy—from the smallest fish to the largest fish, from the smallest animal to the largest animal. That kind of stuff has never been written.”

The documents will also include decades of fish surveys and inventories collected by the Ambler community and the Alaska Department of Fish and Game.

Commack said all the information will be reviewed by the community’s elders and then distributed to the youth in the form of CDs.

This initiative is being funded by a $39,942 grant from the National Park Service Historic Preservation Fund.

Mike Litterst is a spokesperson for the NPS. Explaining the purpose of the fund, he said, “The National Parks Service distributes these grants to Indian tribes, Alaska Natives, and Native Hawaiian organizations to help them preserve significant tribal places, culture, and tradition.”

For Ambler, Commack said, the traditions recorded through the grant will be used to protect fishing hotspots and uphold the wellbeing of the river.

“We need to know the health of the fish,” Commack explained, “because it’s one of the main diets of our people, besides the caribou, the moose, the bear, and other animals that we eat. It’s food on our table. It’s survival of our people, physically. “

Commack said fish, especially sheefish and salmon, can compose up to 75-percent of the community’s diet when land harvests are poor. And Commack said, in Ambler, where a quart of milk costs five dollars, maintaining subsistence resources stretches beyond cultural preservation to economic necessity.

“A lot of us cannot afford even a whole month just eating off of the local stores,” said Commack. “It’s very expensive up here. And not only that, we’re used to eating the fish, the meat, the caribou, the seasonal food that we get in our area. We’re used to those, and our diet has to continue that way to be physically healthy.”

Commack said the goal of the project is to preserve subsistence resources beyond seven future generations.

The Nome Volunteer Fire Department has a new Acting Chief— Jerry Steiger. City Manager Josie Bahnke appointed Steiger to the job last week.

Explaining the changeover, Steiger said, “There was a transition of the Chief position on last Friday. The Chief Works are appointed by the City Manager, and she made a decision to relieve the Chief Matt Johnson.”

Former Chief Matt Johnson volunteered for the Fire Department for 24 years, serving seven of those years as Fire Chief. During that time, Steiger was Assistant Chief.

Now with the position of Fire Chief in need of filling, Steiger said the Fire Department is working to select a qualified candidate from within its ranks.

“The current situation,” Steiger explained, “is that the officers of the organization of the Nome Volunteer Fire Department are reviewing our personnel to be able to make a recommendation to the City Manager on the qualifications, first of all, and then a recommendation on who should be the next Chief and also the process of how that process will be done.”

But that process is still being figured out. Over the 75 years Nome’s Volunteer Fire Department has been operating, only four Chiefs have lead the organization.

“So each of those Chiefs have been appointed by probably a little bit of a different method each time,” Steiger said. “So it’s not a position that has been routinely appointed, so I think that’s where the process here is in the works.”

In the meantime, Steiger says the Fire Department has the resources it needs to operate in the city’s best interest.

“The big emphasis,” said Steiger, “is that the community is safe. We are one Fire Department. We all are volunteers. We have decades of committed people to the Fire Department, and so we definitely do not lack in any kind of leadership as far as years of experience in running the Fire Department.”

Steiger said the Fire Department plans to make a recommendation for Chief to the City Manager for her to present as a candidate to the City Council by the end of August.